Comfort and Counsel
The second parting of Romeo and Juliet at the balcony looking into Capulet’s orchard was very different from the first. Then, indeed, Romeo had reluctantly torn himself away; but, after all, they had another happier meeting to look forward to on the morrow. Now, all was gloom and uncertainty, and who knew when they would ever see each other again? The lark, the herald of the morning, that sang joyously high overhead,—the golden rays of dawn that pierced the eastern clouds,—only brought sadness to the hearts of the young husband and wife, for they told that the fatal hour of parting had come. Longing to keep Romeo with her, yet dreading the peril he ran if he delayed too long, Juliet one moment implored him to stay, and the next urged him to depart.
“Oh, now be gone; more light and light it grows,” she sighed at last; and Romeo echoed despairingly:
“More light and light; more dark and dark our woes!”
At this moment the nurse came hastily to warn Juliet that her mother was approaching, and now indeed Romeo must take his last farewell. As Juliet looked down to him from the balcony it seemed to her that Romeo’s face, in the gray light of dawn, looked pale as one in the bottom of a tomb, and even his cheering words that spoke of a future meeting failed to bring comfort to her breaking heart.
But she had no time to brood over this sorrow, for she was now called to face another and almost more terrible trial.
Lady Capulet had come to her daughter’s room at this unusual hour to bring news of great importance. The County Paris had renewed his suit to Juliet’s father. All was arranged; the marriage was fixed to take place in three days’ time, on the following Thursday. It did not occur to the parents that Juliet would have any voice in the matter; or, rather, Lady Capulet thought it would be joyful tidings to her, and would help to console her for the death of her cousin Tybalt. She was, therefore, somewhat astonished to find the way in which her news was received. In answer to her intelligence that early next Thursday the gallant, young, and noble gentleman, the County Paris, at Saint Peter’s Church, would happily make Juliet a joyful bride, her daughter exclaimed with fire:
“Now, by Saint Peter’s Church and Peter too, he shall not make me there a joyful bride!”
Juliet went on to say that she would not marry in this haste, and when she did marry it would be Romeo, their enemy, rather than Paris.
Then in came Capulet, her father, and, deaf to all Juliet’s pleadings, he swore in a furious rage that she should marry Paris; and if she did not, she might beg, starve, die in the streets, for he would not own her as a daughter.